Support the genetic welfare problems web resource
Genetic Welfare Problems of Companion Animals
An information resource for prospective pet owners
How you can help collect information for this site
We are seeking the assistance of others interested in helping to tackle this problem (might this double as an undergraduate project or assignment?). A large amount of work needs to be done to collect and collate information for presentation at the website and we are seeking volunteers who can help with this. If you do not a have access to a library but have access to the world wide web, we think it may be possible for quite a lot of relevant information to be harvested from the internet.
What we would like volunteers to do is, for a breed and specific genetic welfare problem identified in discussion with us, to collect information under the following headings:
- Breed – name of the breed
- Condition – name of the condition
- Clinical and pathological effects – list and briefly outline
- Diagnosis – brief outline of how the condition is diagnosed.
- Welfare impact – outline how the condition impacts the individual’s welfare eg through causing fear or pain.
- Duration of welfare impact – how long do the adverse welfare impacts last? Seconds, days, weeks, years?
- Severity of welfare impact – what inferences can be made about the intensity of the adverse feelings caused? Can they be assigned to mild, moderate or severe categories?
- Number of animals affected – it is often possible to make a reasonable first estimate of the number of animals likely to be affected based on knowledge of proportion of population affected and total population size (ideally at both national and global levels). The basis of estimates should be made clear and comment made as to their reliability.
- Genetics – brief outline of information on the genetics of the problem, if known (eg associated with a widely prevalent recessive allele).
- Detection of affected and carrier animals – Can clinically unaffected animals carry the harmful genes? Can carriers be detected? If so, how? What questions should prospective buyers/owners ask of breeders or retailers?
Data submitted to the project will be scrutinised by UFAW staff and UFAW will have editorial and quality control responsibility for material posted at the website.
We are focusing on conditions that have a clear adverse impact on the welfare – the quality of life – of the animal. We are keen to try to cover, from the outset, a wide spread of taxa (fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals).
Acknowledgement will be given at the website to those contributing good-quality information to UFAW.
Some sources of information
The following may be some of the sites that you may wish to visit when beginning your search for information. However, even if these are relevant, you will need to expand your search beyond these. You may also find breed society websites such as The Kennel Club – www.thekennelclub.org.uk good sources of information.
- www.cawc.org.uk The Companion Animal Welfare Council’s (2006) Report on ‘Welfare Aspects of Modifications, through Selective Breeding or Biotechnological Methods, to the Form, Function, or Behaviour of Companion Animals’ is available at this site.
- www.vetsci.usyd.edu.au/lida LIDA - Listings of inherited disorders in animals - is an on-line database managed by Dr Paul McGreevy of the University of Sydney’s Faculty of Veterinary Science which is designed to gather, collate and disseminate data on the prevalence of inherited disorders among Australian dogs.
- www.upei.ca/cidd. The homepage of the Canine Inherited Disorders Database This database seeks to reduce the incidence of inherited disorders in dogs by providing information to owners and breeders, and to facilitate the best management possible of these conditions by providing current information to veterinarians. It is a joint initiative of the Sir James Dunn Animal Welfare Centre at the Atlantic Veterinary College, University of Prince Edward Island, and the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association.
- www.vet.cam.ac.uk/idid The inherited diseases dogs database, run by the University of Cambridge Veterinary School. This web site contains a guide to diseases/conditions of pure bred dogs which are likely to be transmitted wholly or partly through a genetic mechanism.
- www.fabcats.org/breeders/inherited_disorders/index.php. Managed by the Feline Advisory Bureau, this website details confirmed and suspected inherited disorders in cats.
- www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/livestock/horses/facts/info_congenital.ht. This Canadian website, managed by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, details congenital anomalies and inherited disorders of the horse.
- http://www.rvc.ac.uk/VetCompass/Benchmarking.cfm The VetCompass project at the Royal Veterinary College collects data about companion animals from veterinary practices in the UK with the aim of determining, among other things, the prevalence of various diseases. It is under development but has published preliminary information about the relative proportions of various breeds in the dog and cat populations which will enable rough estimates of the population sizes of these breeds.
How to start
If you are interested in contributing to this project by collecting data for UFAW to edit, assimilate and include on this new website, please contact UFAW (01582-831818) to discuss selection of a suitable genetic welfare problem on which to start.
